tag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842wintersweetwintersweetwintersweet2017-04-06T00:49:27Ztag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1582473wintersweet @ 2017-04-05T17:48:002017-04-06T00:49:27Z2017-04-06T00:49:27Zpublic0Finally getting around to deleting my LJ account. Find me on twitter or (rarely) Dreamwidth.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1582473" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1579771Yuletide Letter2015-10-28T05:12:59Z2015-10-28T05:12:59Zpublic0&nbsp;Dear Yuletide Writer,<br /><br />Take pity on me, because this is the first time I've decided to not just enjoy the fruits of Yule after they're shared with the public but actually try to participate. So my letter is late and possibly weird or unhelpful. At any rate, please use what works for you and ignore things that don't. I'm only putting things here in case you want to use them, not to make your life more difficult. &nbsp;I'm just thrilled that you're writing a thing! A thing for ME!&nbsp;In conclusion, you're the best Yuletide writer ever and I love you in advance. Yes. Truly.<br /><br /><strong>I love<br /></strong>world-building (food, culture, weather, etiquette, scenery, clothing, history, language...)<br />minor characters<br />slice-of-life or character studies (plot is optional! but I also love a plotty plot!)<br />both plain language and poetic language<br />competence/badassery<br />characters with unexpected but somehow fitting skills and interests<br />good relationships (friends, lovers, between people of different statuses)<br />a partnership of equals<br />consent<br />happy endings<br /><br /><strong>I don't love/please no</strong><br />betrayal<br />tragedy<br />suicide<br />character death<br />general grimdarkness<br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 16.8px;">non-con/mpreg/abuse/manipulation/A-B-O, etc.,</span><br style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 16.8px;" />for these particular fandoms, any of the canon relationships being broken/subbed for other ships<br /><br /><br /><strong>I'm fine with</strong><br type="_moz" />whatever &quot;rating&quot; level you feel moved to write, if you feel moved to write sexytimes<br />OCs to make the story move along<br />AUs if that's your thing<br />nonstandard formats (songs, poems, fragments, letters, etc.)<br />stories set in the past, present, or future relative to the published works<br />a lack of obsessive detail--look, I don't join book clubs or participate much in fandom because I'm <em>not </em>that fan who notices and remembers tiny details, minor characters, subtle verbal motifs, geographical trivia, and so on. Therefore, if you just want to write about two characters chatting, or if you want to make up the distance from X to Y, I won't mind at all!<br /><br /><br />Specific comments for each fandom are below.<br /><br /> <p class="p1"><u><span class="s1">Request 1:&nbsp;</span>Elemental Logic - Laurie J. Marks &nbsp;</u></p> <p class="p1">OK, to be honest, I'm still finishing <em>Water Logic</em>. Almost there!</p><p class="p1">Things I love about this series: the range of sexualities, the range of relationships and family structures, gender is mostly not an issue, not everyone is white, the food, the realness of the physical setting, books!!!, glyphs, ravens, weird magic, a culture that actively tries (if often fails) to not suck. Also, how people fall in love with each other's strengths and personalities, not their superficial attributes.&nbsp;<br /><br />My OTP is&nbsp;Karis and Zanja, though all the other canonical relationships are great.&nbsp;<span class="s1">I'd love to see Karis and Zanja together. If you do write about them, I really don't want to see them hurting each other. Sexy is fine, cute is fine, domestic is fine. Kickass is fine, too. I also</span>&nbsp;love Garland--it'd be extra nifty if he showed up!<br />&nbsp;</p> <u>Request 2: The Goblin Emperor - Katherine Addison &nbsp;<br /></u> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">Things I love about this book: the writer doesn't play with my heart or kick me in the feels for making the mistake of caring, the elaborate worldbuilding, the food, details of clothing and knickknacks, people trying their best to do the right thing, the tangle of caring and etiquette and obligations and AHHHH. Ahem.<br /><br />As I wrote in my request, I would actually enjoy almost any characters in any combination! I'm just MOST interested in: Shal&euml;an being a piratical badass (perhaps she has a lady friend or three!), Cala and Csevet and Beshelar being awesome, Vedero studying the stars (hmm, perhaps <em>she</em> has a lady friend!), Maia and Csethiro being Maia and Csethiro. Or really any of them just having a normal day. It's all good as long as nothing horrible happens to anyone.</span></p> <p class="p1"><u><span class="s1"><br />Request 3:&nbsp;Ascension - Jacqueline Koyanagi &nbsp;</span></u></p> <p class="p1">Things I love about this book: Women kicking ass, family from strangers, not everyone is white, not everyone in super great physical condition, people are smart, aliens are weird, space opera!<br /><br />Things I hate about this book: THERE'S NOT MORE. WHYYYY<br /><br />Other characters are fine, too; though mostly I'm interested in Tev and Alana's relationship (and their being happy together!). But explore whichever direction pulls you.&nbsp;<br /><br />&nbsp;</p>Thank you again!&nbsp;(And feel free to contact me through the mods if you have a question.)<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1579771" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1579465wintersweet @ 2015-10-27T20:16:002015-10-28T03:16:26Z2015-10-28T03:16:26Zpublic0&nbsp;test<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1579465" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1560583Two completely unrelated questions2011-02-07T22:08:08Z2011-02-07T22:08:08Zpublic01. There are new-Who and Torchwood novels, right? Are they any good? (My library doesn't have any, but there's ILL.) I've read, like, one good media tie-in novel in my life. Well, maybe three...<br /><br />2. An entire plate of roasted veg is not working for me as a dinner. What entree can I serve alongside? Special snowflake preferences: Ideal entrees would be vegetarian (dairy, eggs, and soy okay), or using sausage (TJ's and WF sales provide decent sausage), or easy-to-prepare fish. We're currently roasting some combination of Asian and traditional sweet potatoes, whole shallots, regular and Chantenay carrots, turnips and rutagabas, parsnips, and golden and red beets. Just olive oil, a bit of black pepper, and a bit of salt is what's going in. They come out nicely caramelized on the edges, though not at all wet. (I skip the parsnips and turnips.) I just don't know what to serve with them. Things like lentils and so on seem a little too carby.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1560583" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1560336OH. OH MFG.2010-11-23T20:12:17Z2010-11-23T20:12:17Zconfusedpublic4Name of anime (based on a manga): <i>Banana Bread no Pudding</i><br /><br />Description: <i>Now that Ira's older sister is getting married, who will take her to the bathroom after 10 p.m. and sing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" outside the bathroom door in order to protect her from the beautiful, androgynous, child-eating clown? Will marrying a closeted gay man help?</i><br /><br />(I had to read it aloud to my husband and brother-in-law.)<br /><br />*tears of laughter*<br /><br />(It's from 1977.)<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1560336" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1560039Spices2010-09-28T22:33:06Z2010-09-29T01:35:41Zpublic0Can someone tell me why the jaggery powder at the nearest Indian market has fat/saturated fat in it? o_O I was in there for cumin and I thought I'd take a look at it (I'm thinking about switching to something like muscovado for my coffee and tea, since it has vitamins and minerals that even turbinado sugar doesn't). It didn't list any ingredients other than dried cane sugar, but as I've noticed on the labels of Japanese items, the translated labels are completely wrong as often as not. <br /><br />(This is true even on things that would be to their advantage to list, like fiber, protein, and vitamins--I'm guessing there are high fees or laborious processes involved in getting those things officially re-tested by the FDA or something. :/ I don't know whether the manufacturers realize how obsessively certain Americans read food labels, particularly foodie and health nut types who shop at Asian markets; they're probably depressing their sales quite a bit this way. Enough to offset the fees that I imagine exist? I have no idea...)<br /><br />I need to get more glass or metal jars. If there are some out there that come with little spoons attached, that would be ideal...I paid $1.29 for 100g of cumin, but I could have gotten 200g for $2.29 or 400g for $3.99. The price difference on the cardamom compared to Safeway is really striking, even considering that I am not cool enough to deal with the pods (yet). Anyway, we use a lot of cumin around here, so it'd be good to be able to keep more of it around.<br /><br />I'm reading <i>Monsoon Diary: A Memoir with Recipes</i>, by Shoba Narayan, and it's both interesting (a firmly placed view of a specific part of India [outside Madras], a specific class, being a girl and a woman, etc.) and appetizing. I like Indian vegetarian food, but as with many topics, I often learn better from a narrative than from reading a list ("South Indian food often features flavors x, y, and z, but does not include a, b, and c more commonly found in the north.") It's much better to have an image of young Shoba's dad drinking coffee (not tea) or her orthodox Brahmin aunt making a fuss about an eggless cake made in a pan that had previously had a cake with eggs in it. I know memoirs are personal memories, and those are always up for debate (C.'s international students from the same used to argue about whether certain dishes were authentic, what certain symbols meant, and so on, and I've gotten in similar arguments about slang and food.) So when I was younger, I used to acquire history by sort of triangulating among the best-researched historical fiction, rather than basing what I took in on any one book.<br /><br />EDIT: Narayan's book goes places many food memoirs don't--college, grad school (not culinary school), etc. I'm still reading it and it keeps changing. :)<br /><br />Anyway, I recommend it, and it's one of the rare food memoirs that will be good for vegetarians. The recipes will make anyone hungry, though, so don't read it on an empty stomach!<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1560039" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1559648Nancy Pearl is trying to name a genre, perhaps unnecessarily2010-08-03T17:45:16Z2010-08-03T17:45:16Zpublic0I thought it was going to be an actual recent genre, but no, it's what I think of as magical realism, but perhaps the ship has sailed with interstitial. If you want to write her about it, the information is here: <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128823435&sc=fb&cc=fp#genre">http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128823435&sc=fb&cc=fp#genre</a><br /><br />I don't know all that much about the interstitial movement, so if you want to pop over there with links and so forth, it might be good.<br /><br />She's talking about <i>Miss Hargreaves</i> by Frank Baker, <i>Under Heaven</i> or <i>The Lions of Al-Rassan</i> by Guy Gavriel Kay, and <i>Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell</i> by Susanna Clarke.<br /><br />I really thought the latter was simply fantasy, if indeed a kind of historical fantasy that mines an era we've rarely seen and written in a particular tone, and without the romantic overtones that HF sometimes has.<br /><br />Anyway, the comments are rather dumb so far, including the person who thinks that a book titled <i>The Lotus Eaters</i> is engaging in plagiarism (I sincerely hope that person is in secondary school).<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1559648" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1559459Inception2010-07-31T20:58:56Z2010-07-31T20:58:56Zthoughtfulpublic0<span class="cuttag_container"><span style="display: none;" id="span-cuttag___1" class="cuttag"></span><b>(&nbsp;<a href="http://wintersweet.dreamwidth.org/1559459.html#cutid1">Spoilt (if you click here)</a>&nbsp;)</b><div style="display: none;" id="div-cuttag___1" aria-live="assertive"></div></span><br /><br />Anyway, it's on my very short list of sf films that are worth watching. I'm glad there have been a few lately.<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1559459" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2009-05-01:180842:1558902Hmm.2009-08-04T06:01:36Z2009-08-04T06:01:36Zpublic1LJ is supposed to be automatically crossposting to here, but it's not, and I'm not sure what to do about it...<br /><br /><img src="http://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=wintersweet&ditemid=1558902" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> comments